All The Great Things Are Simple
by fairytalemanipulator
Summary: However, for Draco Malfoy, these great things are immeasurably complicated. Based on the quote by Winston Churchill. Canon HG, RHr, Draco/Astoria at end . Please review.


**Title: All The Great Things Are Simple**

**Author: fairytalemanipulator**

**Summary: But for Draco Malfoy, these great things are immeasurably complicated. Based on the quote by Winston Churchill. Canon. Please review.**

**A/N: I've been working on this for about a month. Reviews will be so appreciated that I might just cry because that's how hard I worked on this! Yes, there is a happy ending, and the whole thing sticks to canon.**

**----**

"_All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honour; duty; mercy; hope." – Sir Winston Churchill_

**----**

**Freedom**

It was twilight and the fog stretched long across the great land, opening up before his very eyes.

Malfoy's chest loosened and he gasped, long and hard, before he managed to choke out a breath and then just _breathe_ the opaque evening air that was only now beginning to fill with mourning keens.

Outside Hogwarts he stumbled, away from the warm embraces of his parents and off the grounds while he could because he knew that they would all be arrested in a matter of minutes, a matter of seconds, whenever the Aurors would remember to swoop down and cart them away.

But time had no meaning right now, and the clocks of many were frozen at battle as was evidenced by the bodies he inadvertently stumbled over while crossing the paths of his once-loved school.

Involuntarily he felt the bile in his stomach reach far too high and convulsed, throwing up stomach acid since he had not eaten in at least a day. Draco dry heaved as he walked, on and further into the gloom of the quickly approaching night as wailing sounds of mothers and fathers greeted his ears in reproach.

_I didn't do this. I couldn't stop it._

"I could have stopped it," he gasped out loud, falling to his knees and feeling broken glass stick in his bare hands as they pounded the cobbled stone beneath him. He saw, more than felt, the shards shove their way into his skin. Draco was beyond feeling at this point. "I did this."

In his mind the scenes played out again, his cowardly hiding spots and cruel attempts at murder running in repeated loops through his warped brain. _I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry._ Creevey's crumpled body, small and listless on the ground. _So young I'm sorry._ Fred Weasley's dying hex that he had watched shoot out the end of his wand before being hit from behind by some Death Eater. _Too late I'm sorry._

Malfoy didn't know he was talking to himself until his own voice echoed back at him, high pitched and frightened with _Sorry_ and _Merlin help us_ reflecting back.

He hardly noticed as another set of footsteps neared him, only raising his head when torn trainers met him at eye level.

The last person he wished to see at this moment stood before him, hair in disarray and eyes red-rimmed with tears. Draco was suddenly assaulted with memories of the only hours-before scene at the Room of Requirement and felt tears dripping down his gaunt cheeks for the loss of Crabbe, someone who had been a loyal friend—no, not friend. Draco didn't have friends, he had almost forgotten for a minute.

Harry Potter had come, to see the grounds still littered with bodies needing to be taken into the Great Hall. He had stumbled upon Malfoy, almost thinking him another casualty until he saw the heaving of broad shoulders and aggressive muttering.

Harry Potter, the great victor in the war, did not look as though he had won at the moment.

"You didn't do this, Malfoy," he said softly, eyeing the broken boy with open sympathy. Harry was surprising himself with his words, thinking at first to draw his wand and use the hardest Unforgiveable curse on the lad. Watching his shoulders shake with tears, he felt an unbearable amount of pity and shame for Malfoy. "Voldemort did, and he's gone now. You and your family are safe,"

Draco's traditional scowl was gone. The snobby little brat had disappeared and was replaced with a shattered spirit that found it difficult to look at the boy he had tried to kill mere hours ago.

"What do you know of my family, Potter," Malfoy spat through more spasms of retching. He had accidentally lingered on _Voldemort_, remembering the snake eyes and horrible tortures he was forced to bear witness to. "_You know nothing._"

Harry remained standing, watching as Draco cowered on the ground. He felt oddly disconnected, and knew that if Ron was here instead of him then Malfoy would be dead already. "I know your mother risked her life to save me, just to find out if you were still alive. I know that you couldn't have killed me because you weren't trying hard enough, and you weren't going to kill Dumbledore either."

Malfoy was utterly stunned by the compassion in his voice, and felt no derision for the boy he wished dead on more than one occasion. For the first time in his life, Draco's feelings were bubbling on the surface. He had learned to compartmentalize in his years of pathetic life, learning that showing terror and fright would only earn him beatings and _crucios_ once he became one of Them. He was truly not an evil person—he was just a boy raised in darkness, never given the opportunity for the light until it was much too late. Sobs were choking the blonde but he forced them back, determined to keep some sense of obscure dignity.

"You aren't a killer, Malfoy," Harry continued, his gaze distant as he remembered those who had fallen. He lapsed into silence for a moment as tears rose unbidden in his already-burning eyes. "You had no choice, your family's lives were in your hands. You were trapped."

There was stillness as both boys pondered the implications of those words, the meaning of the loss of Lord Voldemort.

"I'm free now," Draco murmured to himself, mind racing ahead of mouth and watching with detached fascination as blood pooled under his bleeding hands. "I'm free now."

"We're all free now," Harry whispered, almost reaching down to grasp Malfoy's shoulder then backing away, not knowing what direct contact would do to the jumpy Death Eater (_not a Death Eater_, Harry told himself firmly. _A victim as well)_. He took a few steps back as Draco looked up, bewildered at the turn of events. Harry hoped his once-classmate would remember none of this tomorrow; his glazed eyes shone with extreme fatigue and delirium. "Go back to your parents, Malfoy. They were terrified when they thought they lost you."

Harry turned and quickly picked his way through the wreckage back to where he belonged, as Malfoy remembered with aching clarity that the Weasleys had lost a member of their family today as well.

He would not bring up this talk with Potter ever again, nor would Harry address it in their tight-lipped encounters after the war. Both of them remembered though, because neither could forget.

Everyone had lost something today.

But Draco and his family gained something in the midst of all the sorrow.

Yes, they had their freedom now.

And with that thought in mind, Draco Malfoy stood on unsteady legs. He took a last look at the battlefield, smoke still rising in the night air from curses and spells aplenty.

As he turned to head back to the Great Hall and face the sentencing that was certain and inevitable, he looked up at the sky.

Somehow, through the lasting smoke and black clouds, he saw a single bright star.

**Justice**

Malfoys as a whole didn't believe in justice. Draco scoffed at the very idea of it; after all, look at what his father had gotten away with for so many years, what sorts of antics Potter could cook up and never even serve a detention—yes, justice was a foreign notion, filled with pangs of regret that Draco would have never associated with himself.

Until now.

The courtroom seemed to loom before his eyes, the people endless, endless and silent as the grave. Their eyes were following them, the Malfoys, as they were marched across the cold ominous floor by Bill Weasley and an Auror he did not recognize. His mother was trembling, and he could feel her tremours run up and down his body as they were so close to each other he could feel her cold skin on his own. Her face, however, betrayed none of her fears and kept its haughty, indifferent attitude about. Only the other Malfoys could see what was under the surface. His father, on the other hand, looked visibly worried for the first time that Draco could remember. There was no Dark Lord, no servants, no one left to believe that they had been Imperiused as his father had tried before, no way to weasel out of paying for their mistakes and cruelty—there were no more special favours to be had. They had no allegiance to any side anymore, but Draco knew that his mother's act of saving Harry Potter had to count for something. They were truly floating on a shipwreck of doubt, and there was no more was there a person to pull them ashore.

With rough hands, they were forced down into the seats whose golden chains clinked dangerously but did not bind. Without a backwards glance, the eldest Weasley son walked away and Malfoy remembered again that they had lost one of the twins—he could see it in the grey circles under the redhead's eyes. With a sharp feeling of something like sorrow, he shook off his _blood traitor related _thoughts and found himself swallowed by the silence in the packed, watchful room.

Justice was sweet, Draco supposed, and he saw his mother's pale knuckles become nearly transparent as she gripped the edge of the wooden chair tightly. Justice was sweet for these onlookers who had no clue, no _bloody idea_, what it was like to be in their situation.

He watched with undisguised animosity as Potter, Granger, and The Weasel King himself entered the desolate chamber to a smattering of applause and eruption of whispers. They cracked fake smiles and settled at the front, dressed in their best robes and eyeing the Malfoys with—_was that pity?_

He felt an undeniable anger as he watched them, happily together, no problems anymore now that the Dark Lord was gone—and here he was, at their mercy, probably destined to spend the rest of his life in Azkaban or soulless thanks to the Dementors.

"Case number fifteen-hundred and seventy seven, Death Eaters Lucius, Narcissa, and Draco Malfoy being tried for their role in the torture and murder of Muggleborns, Muggles, witches, and wizards alike in the times of war," The courtroom silenced under the booming voice echoing through the unforgiving stone, all eyes still glued to the three figures sitting as if carved from wood in the center of the circular court. Draco's heart plummeted further—nary a sympathetic eye in the audience; in fact, all looked quite vicious, and Draco quaked as his eyes landed suddenly on Lavender Brown who was permanently scarred on the entire left side of her body. She hissed inaudibly at the sudden eye contact with the blonde boy and he averted his gaze instantly, feeling as if doused with cold water.

_This is not Hogwarts._

"Witnesses for the defense: Harry James Potter, Hermione Jean Granger, and Ronald Bilius Weasley," announced the newly instated Wizengamot head, causing louder whispers and disbelieving grunts from the bystanders. Narcissa's eyes widened, and then softened imperceptibly, losing their hard edge that had always made her seem like a block of ice.

It was with a visible, and audible shock, that Draco Malfoy reacted.

Witnesses…for the defense. He was stunned, but not utterly bemused like his father seemed to be—of course, the Golden Trio believed in the good in everyone, the deluded buffoons.

Then he remembered with a shock that they had saved his life that night, and if he had been in their place—_would I have done the same_?

_You are not a killer_, Potter's voice still echoed in his head, the words connecting the two boys for a moment. _You didn't do this._

Perhaps justice was—just, after all.

Honor

"I don't want to do this anymore."

His voice trembled slightly, very slightly, and only those closest to him would have caught the touch of desperation that broke through a cold, constructed façade built as a brick wall around him.

As it was, he was laying with Pansy Parkinson in the boy's dormitory of Slytherin at the beginning of their sixth year. Crabbe and Goyle were satisfied with Draco's promise that he would reward them in chocolates if they slept in the common room for the night, and Blaise was off gallivanting with a Ravenclaw witch.

So it was just him and Pansy, like she had always wanted it to be. Draco wasn't a fool and he saw the girl's lust for him—he didn't return it although he was more than happy to use her advances to his own satisfaction. But she would always be a friend to him, or whatever sense of friend a Malfoy could ever have.

Hearing his cracking voice, she raised herself slightly off his chest, her bare shoulders gleaming in the moonlight leaking through the cracked curtains. The look in her eyes was one of fear and trepidation, as was evident in her reply.

"Don't say that, Draco. He has spies everywhere,"

"Don't tell me," Malfoy said through gritted teeth, his hand clenching in her black hair. "What I can and cannot say, Pansy,"

"It's too dangerous," she whispered, and she shifted so he could see her face. Her pretty lips were drawn tight as she scowled down at him for the first time. "We have to uphold our family honour, Draco. And as such, it should be an honour to you to serve Him."

And was it his imagination or did she look angry at his questioning of their beliefs? Her dark eyes shone with something akin to malice, as close as she would get to turning it on him. A tree branch rattled against the window and they both jumped, Pansy moving her hands to clasp his own. He pushed her away, fearing the clinginess, and she rose off of him with a sigh and curled up on the other side of the bed.

"It _is_ an honour," Pansy whispered fiercely at him, her head turned away. She looked small and diminutive, and he couldn't help treacherous thoughts from leeching his brain as he watched her. What did this girl know about honour? What had she ever done for the Dark Lord? She had let the satin sheets slip from around her bare body and she was exposed almost all the way down. In the light, her skin glowed and he almost forgot about the Cabinet, and for a minute he was just a young man enjoying the pleasurable sight of a woman. Then, he recalled it with grief as he caught sight of the Mark decorating her once-unmarred left forearm, the evil tattoo dancing in the light like her skin used to.

They were so young.

This was just a little girl, how dare she speak like she knew what his task was? As if she had any right to judge him.

Draco turned away from the naked girl, pulling the sheets around him and biting his tongue to keep from voicing his thoughts out loud. There were things he dared not even say to her, and now that she preached of honour and surely duty to the Lord, he had no one left.

For the first time, Malfoy learnt the meaning of being alone. He had no real friends, Pansy and Blaise were the closest to him, and yet they would betray his confidence in a heartbeat to gain trust with the Dark Lord.

Draco Malfoy was no Harry Potter, that's for sure. If he was Potter, even with his family's life hanging over his head, he would have gone to Dumbledore and asked the senile old man to solve all his problems for him.

Draco did not have that option—he was being watched, this he knew. He had a task to complete. Not only was the Malfoy name at stake (_Malfoy honour_, his mind hissed at him in a voice that sounded perilously close to Pansy's), but all of their lives. The responsibilities were tearing him apart.

Pansy spoke of honour, what did she know of honour? The girl slept with any boy who asked her, and Draco would have to be an idiot to think that he was the only one she gave in to passion with. Her family was not high up in the Death Eater ranks, but as the Malfoy name had fallen out of favour quite suddenly they were taking the chance to move up.

Suddenly, Draco was filled with fear. What if she used his information, the worry that he voiced to her, as ammunition? He eyed the girl at his side with distaste, and thought of the unsteady alliances forged within the Death Eater circles that were slowly, sneakily breaking.

He would need to learn to watch his words, he remembered now, as he watched her breathe deeply, evidently asleep.

Malfoy's head fell back into the goose-feather stuffed pillows, and he closed his eyes, mind whirring. It would not be honourable to betray his family to _precious Potter and his band of merry misfits _in order to save them, for it was their blood that flowed through his veins. It was supposed to be an honour to serve Him, but now even Lucius Malfoy grew haggard and grim at the fact that the Lord frequented the Manor.

_Is this what an honour is supposed to feel like?_ Draco wondered, his heart pounding erratically as it had taken to doing whenever he thought about the Room of Requirement and the required job that lay within. _Should I feel frightened at the thought of helping the Dark Lord? _

It would be an honour for him to accept head boy next year, if that were possible. It would certainly be an honour to be accepted into Snape's Advanced Potions class. Those thoughts made him happy, and he would be grateful for those opportunities. But then—what was this feeling rising within him when he related his cause, the Dark Lord's cause, with honour? Was that…apprehension?

_This is not an honour. It is a curse I was born with._

Suddenly afraid of what he was thinking and starting to believe, Draco closed his eyes and attempted to force himself to fall asleep. Lately that nightly routine had been hard to come by; he had frequent night terrors that woke him shaking and sweaty.

Thoughts of honour raced through his head, Malfoy crest raised high and Dark hexes from his father's teachings flitting in and out of his partially awake state.

_It would be an honour_, Draco thought as his eyes flew open in realization_, to be free, to have a childhood, and not to serve anybody._

But those simpler times were far off, and in between then and now he knew deep down that there would be no escaping the turmoil.

And so he tossed and turned, as Pansy eventually gravitated back to his side of the bed and reached her arms across his bare torso. He did not stop her because he desired the comfort, he needed her touch to break away from wishes and head back into reality, cold reality. Therefore his restless dreams were fraught with creatures of the Dark and frightening green light; he awoke once again in a cold sweat.

**Duty**

He knew not what to do with the robes, the new black ones that were now stained with blood. The Dark Lord's Cruciatus Curse had left his mind foggy and blank, and he was for the moment sitting on the edge of his bed at Malfoy Manor where Voldemort was cackling three stories below.

Yet, Draco's biggest worry right now were the robes. He fumbled with the hem, lifting them up and removing them to get down to the root cause of where the blood seemed to be coming from. He was soaked in it, from head to foot, and even his shoes had left a trail of crimson liquid as he stumbled up the stairs. Panting, he pulled the black garment off of him and lay them on the ground, proceeding to painfully stand up and make his way to a mirror. With a gasp of horror, he saw the blood that had soaked through every layer of his clothes.

His mind flashed in sudden consciousness and he realized that it _wasn't his._

Revolted, Draco gagged, doubling over in agony as the reality of the situation came crashing down upon him. He had lain in the spot at the Dark Lord's feet where Charity Burbage had been recently eviscerated, as well as that Muggle family that the Dark Lord decided Goyle to use for practice and just today, a Mudblood who had spoken too openly in Diagon Alley about Lord Voldemort's uprising.

No, the blood spilt was not his own. It was a Mudblood's, a Muggle's—but the blood looked just like his. There was no muddy quality, no despicable change—it was just blood.

And now he fell, quite ungraciously, onto his plush carpeted floor and curled into a little ball, crying as if he were five years old and in his mother's arms once more. For he realized, all at once, what was happening all around him and how he was in no way shape or form able to stop those events from occurring.

No, he was not crying in his mother's arms, because his mother was downstairs taking her turn with the Cruciatus, and his father was being forced to watch with his cold mask wavering and slipping as he watched his wife scream for pity and claw at the air in terror.

This was duty to the Dark Lord. This was what he was supposed to do, and enjoy duty.

But Draco could find no pleasure in the pain of spilling blood, and he saw no glory in destroying families the way his own was being dismantled.

Lucius always said, duty to the Dark Lord is the greatest honour—but Draco had stopped listening to his father and started listening more to himself these days, a dangerous thing for a Death Eater's son to do. Especially one with a required task, that would either bring him into the Lord's inner circles or sign his death warrant.

Duty was a fickle friend who required loyalty and trust above all else, but Draco saw no possible way to trust the evil being that slit children's throats with a casual flick of his cruel wand and made his mother beg for death.

**Mercy**

Their world was humming with light and sound as the entirety of their actions crashed around them that fateful night. They were naught but children, pushed in the way of disputes and bloodshed, and Hermione was in the midst of it. As she lay on the Malfoy rug with blood trickling out the corner of her mouth, she could hear somewhere in the back of her mind the cruel laughter of a wicked woman. Beneath her there were sounds, coming from the dungeon; she knew Ron and Harry could hear her screams because she couldn't hold them in for long with Bellatrix behind the Cruciatus curse. And she could see through hazy eyes a pale, terrified face, the face of a boy that had no choice in his life, who was broken beyond belief in his heart and soul.

Hermione saw something in those slate grey eyes, in the way the lines creased on his forehead, that horrible night at the Manor with Bellatrix Lestrange leering over her prone form.

He was upside down in her vision, and the ringing in her ears drowned out whatever cruel comments the Death Eater was making, but she could see him.

It was in his body language. It was in his posture.

It was in him, and she could feel it washing over her like a wave of warm ocean tidings, a flare in his eyes that betrayed his true nature contrary to the lies he had been fed since birth.

Apparently Lucius could feel it too, because with a strange worried glance at his son, he nudged him with an elbow and the mask fell back into place.

But there was still something in his silver gaze that kept her from giving up altogether, and with every _crucio_ she only saw it getting stronger.

It was an apology, it was a human emotion, and it was mercy that he was showing her in a room full of vicious animals who wanted nothing else but her guts wrenched out and scattered in the furthest corners of the room. He had the upper hand in this position, yet he moved not a muscle as his aunt screeched at him to torment the stupid Mudblood who had pretended to be smarter than him at school.

After the first round of torture, she was left alone for a bit with a warning that sudden movement would prove fatal on her part as the Death Eaters backed into corners and discussed something with tense and unforgiving faces. Suddenly Malfoy knelt by her side quickly and angrily as if to strike her. As she recoiled, her reflexes heavy with soreness, he glanced around to see who was watching and hastily, so fast she almost missed it, he took his handkerchief and wiped away the blood on her face. The kerchief was embroidered with the Malfoy crest, a dark green "M" presiding right in the middle. With dazed fascination she looked at her blood congealing on top of the emblem as if declaring its equality to the pureblood regime. Draco Malfoy had performed an act of compassion, and Hermione was too bemused to realize that the purebred bigot himself was touching her muddied, filthy blood.

Tucking the embroidered fabric back into his pocket, he stood with grace on wobbly legs and shot her an unreadable look before backing away as Bellatrix entered once more, high pitched laughter sending unrest among the ranks.

For the first time in the war, Hermione Granger felt something akin to relief, because all was not lost when a Malfoy found it possible in his heart to show a Mudblood a bit of kindness.

The old tales of Draco Malfoy show him as regal and haughty, an atrocious wizard with a reputation for violence and prejudice. Hermione Granger saw otherwise in the face of a boy too torn and frightened to be evil. She saw the same boy, lanky and regal, at the sentencing a few months later. Hermione remembered his agonized face, pulled his actions from the foggy recesses of her_ crucio_-induced pain, and testified on his behalf. Perhaps to everyone else in the courtroom it was insignificant, but for a Mudblood and a Malfoy it was certainly something laudable.

Mercy was a strange beast, rearing its head at times of great adversity and potential. Hermione Granger found that even in the darkest of times, this creature could worm its way into the unlikeliest of hearts and restore faith in a brighter future.

Forever she would remember that boy with the silk handkerchief.

**Hope**

At the dawn of the day, he was up and ready, pacing the floor of the family manor as the rest of its inhabitants snoozed. Malfoy anticipated the events of the day with trepidation and slight anguish that he remembered feeling in his seventh year of school—yes, it was quite like that, but nowhere near as serious as the occurrences of that year.

No, it was not as serious, perhaps, but still not to be taken lightly. Today was to be the day that Scorpius left for school.

Draco barked at the elves in the kitchen who were hurriedly making breakfasts, causing squeals and panic among them as their master expressed his displeasure of his son's departure on the creatures that faithfully served him. He winced at his attitude, knowing that Astoria would have his head for disturbing their house-elves so—she took after the bloody annoying Granger in that respect, for Astoria was noble to a fault yet he couldn't help but admire her more for it, the loving witch.

He was sipping on tea and grumbling to himself when he heard his wife slip in, still in her nightgown with her hair in disarray. There was no need for words, as he took in his own haggard reflection in her eyes, and he thought himself a ninny before realizing that this must be how all fathers feel before letting their sons go.

_Well, perhaps not all fathers…_Draco remembered, thinking of Lucius, a complicated man in his own right.

She sat next to him, laying a graying head on his shoulder, and he patted her thigh absentmindedly as he worried his lip with his teeth.

"He'll be fine," Astoria whispered, her voice laden with motherly tenderness and care. "We raised him well."

Once again Draco thought back to his own childhood, with a mother who was distant and cold after his tenth birthday, when he was required to be a man. Astoria would never be that kind of mother, Draco pondered, and found that he rather preferred it that way.

Their son had brought light back into a darkened manor with an evil past, and those mistakes seemed far in the distance while the mischievous boy roamed the halls. It was Draco's fear to let his son go and become exposed to other kinds of evils while his house succumbed again to the darkness it once belonged to.

"Mum! Dad!" Draco snorted into his cup, catching sight of a thin, blonde head bouncing along. He had tried once or twice to get Scorpius to call them by the more esteemed Mother and Father, only to have his son look at him as if he'd grown a third head.

Rather, Draco preferred being called Dad instead of Father.

"I'm going to Hogwarts today!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, and Draco hadn't the heart to tell him to pipe down.

"You silly boy," Astoria said fondly, smoothing down the fine smooth hair on top of Scorpius's head. "Stop jiggling, will you? Go on and brush your teeth, breakfast will be ready when you come back," Draco said, grinning at his son's childish antics. He had raced over to the fireplace and proceeded to give a large hug to a house-elf, causing it's eyes to widen in confusion and possible distress. "Leave Lissy alone, please, son, she's the one preparing your eggs this morning."

With a shrug, Scorpius bounded off and once again Astoria and Draco were left to their thoughts.

"He grew up so fast…" The Lady Malfoy's tears came out of nowhere, and Draco gritted his teeth in misery. He never knew what to do when women cried, honestly. "It was just yesterday we were getting married, and then he was born a year later with that platinum blonde hair and your mother's eyes—oh, the memories, I feel so old!"

Believing Astoria was looking still as fresh as the day he married her, Draco voiced his disagreements.

"But of course, dear, you can't see it, just like I can't see your aging besides a bit of a receding hairline, really," Astoria said sweetly, patting him on the back and rising. "Must get dressed, the car will be here in an hour."

Draco stared after his wife in astonishment, his eyebrows climbing atop his forehead, wondering how exactly women turned on and off the faucet of waterworks. Then her statement hit him, and he bellowed down the hall after her.

"Woman, I haven't got a receding hairline! Your vision's going too, then!"

----

They were rushing down King's Cross Station, a bit behind schedule due to the Ministry car being early and Scorpius being—well, Scorpius. Draco had crouched down to his level at the brick wall separating platform 9 from platform 10, explaining the magical barrier to Platform 9 3/4, until he realized that his son wasn't really paying attention to him and had gone sort of greenish in the face. Astoria had gone ahead of them with Scorpius's owl and trunk, leaving Draco and the boy on their own.

"Scorpius? What's the matter?" Malfoy was concerned, immediately wondering if he could persuade the new Headmaster to let Scorpius stay at home a bit longer and recover from an apparent illness. "Son?"

All of a sudden the little boy's words started rushing together. "What if no one likes me? What if I can't make any friends? What if people make fun of me? What if they say I'm a Death Eater? What if the girls don't like me? What if I don't do well in class? What will happen if I'm not sorted into Slytherin?"

Taking a breath, Scorpius attempted to plunge back into terrified questions when he felt his father's reassuring hand on his little shuddering shoulder.

"Scorpius Malfoy. Don't you ever let anyone push you around, you hear? They have no reason to speak to you badly, and you should be careful with your anger, do not be unwise," Draco's mouth was set in a firm line as he addressed his son. "If you behave the way your mother and I taught you to behave, and treat others well, everyone will like you,"

"But Dad," Scorpius whispered, his face twisted in pain. "People still remember you, you know? You're Draco Malfoy, and I'm your son,"

Draco's heart broke a bit at the bit of shame he saw flit across his boy's face, but he was determined not to let it show. He had never felt the implications of his past associations and actions as much as he did now, seeing the worried look in his son's eyes. "I know your mother talked to you about this, Scorpius. You cannot let my legacy determine yours. Yes, they remember my name and the things I stood for, but that's not what you stand for. You are so very different from the way I presented myself during my years at school, my son. The way you make yourself out to be is the new name of Malfoy, and your mother and I have faith that you will restore our status to a positive light,"

"That's a lot of pressure," breathed Scorpius, eyes wide as he drank in his father's words. Malfoy laughed and put a gentle arm around his son's shoulders, his grey eyes much softer than they used to be.

"Don't you understand, boy? It's no pressure at all. Just be yourself and you'll do wonderfully."

"But what if—"

"If you fail a class?" Draco preceded his son's question, grinning. "Well, luckily for you, your mother and I had top marks at school so I daresay that's quite unlikely with our amazing brain combination."

"But what if I—"

"If you're sorted into Hufflepuff, or Ravenclaw, or even—" Here Draco momentarily closed his eyes as he willed himself to continue. "Or even into Gryffindor, it won't change anything about how we feel about you or the friends you'll make. Hogwarts isn't divided by house the way it was during my years, Scorpius. You'll meet so many interesting boys and girls, have fun, all right? Don't agonize so much, and oh, keep an eye out for Filch's ghost, I hear he's a nasty one, still telling all the students to stop running in the halls and all—"

Suddenly, Scorpius threw his little arms around his father's neck, and Draco smiled, feeling much older than his years, as he returned the gesture. Unbidden tears rose in his eyes as he fought them back, deeming it improper to sob in the middle of King's Cross.

"Hurry along, then, son! It's almost time," Draco reached for Scorpius, surprised that the eleven year old didn't tug his little hand away as he usually did, and cautiously leaned against the barrier—it opened up into the bustling platform in front of the steaming, scarlet engine that had been the beginning of his own incredible journey. Hearing Scorpius's muted sounds of excitement at the vision of the huge train, Draco muffled his own shock at the amount of heads currently turning his way. Spotting Astoria at the edge of the station waiting anxiously for her husband and son, they flitted over as she began to fuss over Scorpius.

"Now, dear, I put your Cough Draught in the pink vial so if you feel sick," she picked at his collar, eliciting a "MUM!" from the little blonde boy, "Just drink that and you should be fine again. Oh, I should have added a Fever Tonic as well! I knew I was forgetting something—" Here Astoria pulled a rather large lint brush out of her tiny handbag that Scorpius eyed with fear and Draco with unconcealed amusement. "And I packed you some extra toothbrushes, as well as that gummy floss you like, and there's a package of Chocolate Frogs for you to share with your dormitory mates, it's a great way to break the ice, oh how big you've gotten it seems like just yesterday we brought you home from St. Mungo's—"

"Mum," Scorpius intoned, a knowing look on his face. He caught her fluttering, trembling hands in his own little ones in a gesture that seemed more mature than his young age. "I'll be all right, and everything's going to be fine, I promise,"

Astoria wiped away stray tears under the pretext of adjusting her hat. Her long hair flowed, radiating sadness, and Draco channeled her emotions as well as his own and felt rather discouraged in general. "Well then, darling, I suppose you're ready to get on board then?" She sniffled, pulling out a handkerchief emblazoned with a large green "M" and subtly blowing her nose.

Just then the hairs on the back of Draco's neck prickled, and he turned to see Harry Potter staring at him from across the station. Next to him was none other than Ron Weasley, who didn't look as aged as Malfoy would've hoped, and Granger. Potter had one arm around the waist of the youngest Weasley daughter—Ginny Weasley, now Ginny Potter. The other hand was hanging onto a quiet little girl who seemed to be hiding behind the rest, her bright eyes emitting curiosity. She in turn was holding the hand of what looked like the youngest of the Granger-Weasley clan, judging by his shock of red hair. Granger looked a little softer and she had rounded out a bit, as had her husband. The rest of the Weasley and Potter children were already in compartments, hanging out the windows and conversing with the littlest Potter and Weasley who were evidently not old enough for Hogwarts yet.

The Trio seemed to gape at him a bit, and he nodded at them abruptly before turning back to his wife and son. He was a bit startled that no one had tried to hex him here on the platform, and then he remembered—they were all adults now, the war was over, and they were sending a new generation off to Hogwarts. A generation filled with hope for a better tomorrow, with Houses that intermingled and a Dark Lord who would, thankfully, never rise again.

As Draco put an arm around his emotional wife as his son boarded the scarlet train to Hogwarts, he was crushed by a feeling of loss that he had felt on and off for the past week as the day had come closer and closer. He noticed, then, that while many parents smiled and waved their children onward, many more stared mournfully at the train that was reminding them that their little ones were growing up far too quickly. Draco recognized many of the people that had once been in his class—a sneering Blaise Zabini was sending a replica of himself aboard, and there was Dean Thomas with his wife and Seamus Finnigan, as well as the Loony girl and Chang, the old Ravenclaw Quiddich player.

The train sent out a billowing wave of smoke, and the children on board cheered raucously as they noticed the grinding of the engine. With a slight shock, Draco looked for Scorpius only to see him settling in a compartment with none other than one of Weasley and Granger's daughters and what looked like Luna Lovegood's son judging from the butterbeer cap necklace hanging around his little neck. As he watched them all smile and interact with glee (the little Weasley was sweetly passing around a packet of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans), Draco himself cracked a grin, for never in his wildest dreams would he have seen his son befriending a Weasley.

As he waved goodbye with a heavy heart and even heavier arm, and clasped tightly to the waist of his tearful wife, Draco Malfoy felt with surprise how much change had occurred since the last time he stood on this platform. There was now a feeling of hope and joy that radiated throughout his entire being; he felt filled to the brim with emotions he couldn't even describe. He felt—love, a bit of sadness, a dash of tears and a touch of loss. It was a good kind of loss, though, because it wasn't a permanent loss, not in the least; Scorpius would be home for Christmas, bringing tales of mischief and troublemaking that he would no doubt indulge in at school, possibly even with the children of Harry Potter, Parvati Patil, or some other unexpected friends.

Even in his son's absence, Draco had a feeling that Malfoy Manor would not lose the hope it had obtained over the last decade or so.

The Dark Mark hadn't burned in nearly nineteen years. All was well.

**The end.**

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**Well. This took me about three extra weeks to perfect, and I will be terribly sad if I get no reviews for my troubles! I'm planning on doing a Malfoy series with different pairings, just because there's something about his character that draws me in. PLEASE pretty please hit the little button right below and leave a review!  
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